Education: Prisoners

Priti Patel: To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills with reference to Making Prison Work: Skills for Rehabilitation, how many and what proportion of offenders paid for learning in prison in the last year for which figures are available; and how many and what proportion he expects to pay for learning in prison following the implementation of the review's recommendations.

John Hayes: Data on the number offenders currently paying for their learning while in prison is not collected centrally.
	“Making Prisons Work: Skills for Rehabilitation” made clear the Government's view that not all learning is prison should be free, particularly when there is an expectation elsewhere in the system that learners will contribute to costs. We have committed to considering the case for offenders, and employers, contributing to the costs of intermediate and higher level training, and to making sure arrangements for prisoners studying higher education are aligned with mainstream changes from autumn 2012.
	It is not currently possible to estimate how many or what proportion of prisoners will pay for learning in prison until we have considered these issues further.